J. Justin Wilson: Medical society catches obesity hype

WASHINGTONSoon, going to the doctor’s office and having your height and weight checked might not be a simple, routine evaluation, but instead a determination of whether you have a disease. While common...

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J. Justin Wilson
Posted Jun. 28, 2013 @ 12:01 am

WASHINGTON

Soon, going to the doctor’s office and having your height and weight checked might not be a simple, routine evaluation, but instead a determination of whether you have a disease. While common sense says that being fat is typically the consequence of a combination of immoderate eating and laziness, don’t tell the American Medical Association. To this large group of doctors, who really should know better, carrying a few extra pounds is now a “disease.”

So if a fat guy sneezes, should you run for cover lest you catch a case of the “fats”? Not so fast.

While one’s weight can be a contributing factor to actual diseases, there’s little evidence that merely being fat is a disease in and of itself. Evaluations of health statistics by researchers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have found that being moderately overweight is linked with longer lifespan than the officially designated “healthy weight.” Even slight obesity is not linked with a noticeable increased risk of death. The complexities in the debate and in obesity’s effect on the body led the AMA’s Council on Science and Public Health, which evaluated the proposal over a yearlong period, to recommend rejecting the notion that obesity was a disease.

More important than falling into a particular weight-to-height category is the practice of healthy habits. Vigorous exercise, a balanced diet, and refraining from smoking are all important to living a longer, healthier life with a reduced risk of disease. That applies regardless of what arbitrary category the body-mass index (a crude formula using nothing more than your height and weight) puts a person into. (In fact, body-mass index classifies buff athletes as “obese.”)

This common-sense principle is borne out by science. Researchers from the Medical University of South Carolina found that people who ate their fruits and vegetables, didn’t smoke, drank no more than in moderation, and exercised regularly lived longer, regardless of how heavy they were.

It’s even sillier when you consider that the rise in girth has been accompanied by changing environmental factors. Consider the spread of labor-saving devices. We now have lawnmowers that we ride on. Laundry machines. Dishwashers. Few walk anyplace if a car can take you there.

The AMA’s classification of obesity as a “disease” is more than just inappropriate semantics. It has far-reaching effects, starting with undermining the principle of personal responsibility.

The AMA’s decision is only the first attempt of many to take well-understood concepts about medical conditions and apply them to food-related issues in the service of a pro-regulation and pro-trial lawyer ideology.

The next maneuver is a current and developing attempt to declare foods to be “addictive,” like drugs. In other words, putting a cheeseburger on the same level as cigarettes or crack pipes.

When most people think of a drug addict, they think of somebody so broken by substance dependence that he can’t function in society. Somebody so dependent on a chemical that he’s driven to distraction if he doesn’t get a fix. That’s not what the new anti-food activists have in mind. To activist researchers like Kelly Brownell, the engine behind the parallel movement to put “sin” taxes on soft drinks, merely enjoying food makes a person a possible “addict.”

Activists say that since the brain releases pleasure chemicals when a person eats, people can get hooked. Responsible researchers disagree, however. After careful consideration of the meaning of “addiction” and the actual results of the studies, a Cambridge University research team concluded that “criteria for substance dependence translate poorly to food-related behaviors.”

The call of money and influence risks trumping sound science. The AMA’s move allows doctors to chase insurance reimbursements. Calling food “addictive” gives trial lawyers what they need to seek a courtroom payday. But hopefully the common sense that clearly shows that a hot dog isn’t a heroin needle, and that personal responsibility and moderation are key in staying healthy, can still prevail.

J. Justin Wilson is the Senior Research Analyst at the Center for Consumer Freedom, a nonprofit coalition supported by restaurants, food companies and consumers.